Analysis: Commanders, Jayden Daniels setting the football and financial blueprint for the 2025 Vikings

Daniel Snyder owned Washington’s football team from May 25, 1999, to July 20, 2023.

That’s 8,822 days.

He won two playoff games.

Two.

This season’s Washington squad needed 8,815 fewer days to match that postseason win total from the Little General’s Reign of Error.

Seven days to become the darling underdogs of these playoffs.

And now, as the football world huddles for Sunday’s conference title games, the gridiron gods seem poised to present to us the next huge step in this emphatic exorcism of the Snyder Era. The sixth-seeded and red-hot Commanders are one more road upset at pass-challenged Philadelphia from sweeping the NFC’s top three seeds and reaching Super Bowl LIX in what would be one of the most unlikely rags-to-riches stories in NFL history.

And the irony of ironies is this Washington team is the polar opposite of the one Snyder dreamed of when he entered the league as an arrogant businessman who thought he could simply buy the Lombardi Trophy with each misguided offseason bonanza.

The Commanders are doing what every team dreams of financially in the salary cap era: Win big with a really good quarterback on his rookie deal. They’re doing exactly what the Vikings hope to do this fall when they probably transition to J.J. McCarthy, whose cap number ($5 million) will take up only 1.8% of a cap that Overthecap.com estimates will be $272.5 million.

One more victory on Sunday and Washington will do what no other team has done ever — reach the Super Bowl with a rookie starting quarterback.

Daniels, drafted second overall, eight spots ahead of McCarthy, takes up only 2.6% of his team’s cap ($6.9 million as the league’s 24th-highest paid quarterback) this year and will take up only 2.9% ($8.6 million) next year.

Nine key players on Washington’s current roster will have larger cap numbers than the quarterback who has led Washington from 4-13 and worst in the NFC East to 14-5 and the team’s first NFC Championship game in 33 years. Those nine players include important guys in the trenches: Daron Payne and Jonathan Allen on defense and Samuel Cosmi, Andrew Wylie and Tyler Biadasz on offense; top edge rushers Frankie Luvu and Dorance Armstrong; and second-team All-Pro receiver Terry McLaurin.

It’s a whole lot easier building a team that way as opposed to what Atlanta is looking at right now with Kirk Cousins, now a backup quarterback, taking up 14.4% ($40 million) of next year’s salary cap.

Washington, which was notorious for some of the worst free-agent deals in league history under Snyder, is playing with the proverbial house money already. And, according to Overthecap.com, the Commanders rank third in most cap space for 2025 ($87.6 million) behind only the Patriots and Raiders.

Among the NFL’s final four teams, the Eagles rank 21st with a projected cap space of $19.8 million with Jalen Hurts taking up 7.8% of the cap ($21.8 million). The Chiefs ($11.5 million) are 23rd with Patrick Mahomes taking up 24% ($66.3 million), and the Bills are 27th ($7 million over the cap) with Josh Allen taking up 15.8% ($43.2 million).

The Commanders split the season series with Philly this season, winning at home 36-33 in Week 16. Many, however, will bet against the Commanders as 6½-point underdogs.

The Buccaneers played Washington as three-point favorites in Tampa in the wild-card round. Commanders 23, Bucs 20.

The Lions played Washington as 9½-point favorites in Detroit in last week’s divisional round. Young Commanders 45 points and zero turnovers, Seasoned Lions 31 points and five turnovers.

Much like the Lions did in their 31-9 Week 18 beatdown of the Vikings, Detroit defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn threw everything he had at the quarterback. Unlike quivering Sam Darnold, cool-hand Daniels didn’t flinch while being blitzed on 60% of his dropbacks.

According to NextGenStats, Daniels completed 12 of 16 passes for 191 yards and a touchdown when blitzed. He completed 10 of 16 passes for 172 yards and a touchdown when given less than 2.5 seconds to throw. He was 7-of-9 for 109 yards when pressured. The Lions finished with zero sacks and two QB hits while Daniels threw for 299 yards, two touchdowns and a 122.9 passer rating while running 16 times for 51 yards.

If it seems like you’ve never seen anyone quite like Daniels, well, that’s because he’s doing things we’ve never quite seen before from a rookie quarterback. Besides trying to become the first one to reach a Super Bowl, here are some other things Daniels is aiming for on Sunday:

• Surpassing Ben Roethlisberger (2005) with a record 15th win as a rookie.

• Joining Tony Eason, Tom Brady, Eli Manning, Aaron Rodgers and Roethlisberger as quarterbacks to win three road postseason games.

• Joining Rodgers and Roethlisberger as quarterbacks to lead No. 6 seeds to the Super Bowl. Rodgers’ 2010 Packers and Roethlisberger’s 2005 Steelers went on to win the Super Bowl.

So, yeah, it’s safe to say these aren’t the bad old days of Snyder, who made out financially in buying for $800 million and selling for $6.05 billion, but will forever be remembered as one of the worst owners in the history of professional sports.

His 166-226-2 record, including 2-6 in the postseason, was built on the sandy foundations of blockbuster mistakes like giving defensive tackle Albert Haynesworth $100 million and getting back 12 starts; giving Ryan Fitzpatrick $10 million and getting back 16 snaps; and giving 33-year-old quarterback Jeff George a crazy-at-the-time four-year, $14.8 million deal to back up Brad Johnson in 2000.

George went 1-4 in 2000 and 0-2 in 2001 and was gone from the league for good. Unfortunately for Washington, Snyder hung around another two-plus decades.

So, go ahead, Washington. Celebrate this young marvel at quarterback as he leads the D.C. liberation and tries to make his mark on the NFL alongside the likes of Hurts this week and, who knows, maybe Allen or even Mahomes come Feb. 9 in New Orleans.